Relative debugging in an integrated development environment

Abramson, David; Chu, Clement; Kurniawan, Donny; Searle, Aaron

doi:10.1002/spe.932

Cited by 5 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 17 publications

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“…Arguably the most researched debugging technique is delta debugging, which can be used to systematically narrow down possible failure causes by comparing a successful and an erroneous program execution [21]. Other types of debugging technique include slicing [4], focusing on anomalies [4], mining dynamic call graphs [22], statistical debugging [23], spectrabased fault localization [7], angelic debugging [8], data structure repair [10], relative debugging [24], automatic breakpoint generation [25], automatic program fixing using contracts [9], and combinations thereof [26][27][28][29][30]. Orso presents a detailed overview of some of these automated debugging techniques [31].…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

On the dichotomy of debugging behavior among programmers

Beller

Spruit

Spinellis

et al. 2018

Proceedings of the 40th International Conference on Software Engineering

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Debugging is an inevitable activity in most software projects, often difficult and more time-consuming than expected, giving it the nickname the "dirty little secret of computer science." Surprisingly, we have little knowledge on how software engineers debug software problems in the real world, whether they use dedicated debugging tools, and how knowledgeable they are about debugging. This study aims to shed light on these aspects by following a mixed-methods research approach. We conduct an online survey capturing how 176 developers reflect on debugging. We augment this subjective survey data with objective observations on how 458 developers use the debugger included in their integrated development environments (IDEs) by instrumenting the popular ECLIPSE and INTELLIJ IDEs with the purpose-built plugin WATCHDOG 2.0. To clarify the insights and discrepancies observed in the previous steps, we followed up by conducting interviews with debugging experts and regular debugging users. Our results indicate that IDE-provided debuggers are not used as often as expected, because "printf debugging" remains a feasible choice for many programmers. Furthermore, both knowledge and use of advanced debugging features are low. Our results call for strengthening hands-on debugging experience in computer science curricula and have already refined the implementation of modern IDE debuggers.

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Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

On the dichotomy of debugging behavior among programmers

Beller

Spruit

Spinellis

et al. 2018

Proceedings of the 40th International Conference on Software Engineering

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Abramson et al have introduced relative debugging [62], [63], [64], [65], [66], [67]. Relative debugging is implemented in their tool, called GUARD.…”

Section: B Execution Differencingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Augmenting Diffs With Runtime Information

Etemadi,

Sharma,

Madeiral

et al. 2023

IIEEE Trans. Software Eng.

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“…Arguably the most researched debugging technique is delta debugging, which can be used to systematically narrow down possible failure causes by comparing a successful and an erroneous program execution [14]. Other types of debugging technique include slicing [3], focusing on anomalies [3], mining dynamic call graphs [15], statistical debugging [16], spectra-based fault localization [5], angelic debugging [6], data structure repair [8], relative debugging [17], automatic breakpoint generation [18] and automatic program fixing using contracts [7]. Finally, several combinations of the techniques exist [19]- [23].…”

Section: A Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

How developers debug

Beller

Spruit

Zaidman

2017

Preprint

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Debugging software is an inevitable chore, often difficult and more time-consuming than expected, giving it the nickname the " dirty little secret of computer science." Surprisingly, we have little knowledge on how software engineers debug software problems in the real world, whether they use dedicated debugging tools, and how knowledgeable they are about debugging. This study aims to shed light on these aspects by following a mixedmethods research approach. We conduct an online survey capturing how 176 developers reflect on debugging. We augment this subjective survey data with objective observations from how 458 developers use the debugger included in their Integrated Development Abstract-Debugging software is an inevitable chore, often difficult and more time-consuming than expected, giving it the nickname the "dirty little secret of computer science." Surprisingly, we have little knowledge on how software engineers debug software problems in the real world, whether they use dedicated debugging tools, and how knowledgeable they are about debugging. This study aims to shed light on these aspects by following a mixed-methods research approach. We conduct an online survey capturing how 176 developers reflect on debugging. We augment this subjective survey data with objective observations from how 458 developers use the debugger included in their Integrated Development Environments (IDEs) by instrumenting the popular ECLIPSE and INTELLIJ IDEs with our purpose-built plugin WATCHDOG 2.0. To better explain the insights and controversies obtained from the previous steps, we followed up by conducting interviews with debugging experts and regular debugging users. Our results indicate that the the IDE-provided debugger is not used as often as expected, since "printf debugging" remains a feasible choice for many programmers. Furthermore, both knowledge and use of advanced debugging features are low. Our results call to strengthen hands-on debugging experience in Computer Science curricula and can and have already influenced the design of modern IDE debuggers.

show abstract

Relative debugging in an integrated development environment

Cited by 5 publications

References 17 publications

On the dichotomy of debugging behavior among programmers

On the dichotomy of debugging behavior among programmers

Augmenting Diffs With Runtime Information

How developers debug

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